Bumrah To Lead India In Ireland, Prasidh Back Too

These are optimistic times for Indian cricket in terms of player fitness. Just days after bowling coach Paras Mhambrey spoke of misssing Jasprit Bumrah and Prasidh Krishna, the two are back in the Indian team. 

Bumrah will lead India in the three T20Is series against Ireland, while Prasidh, who played a match in the KSCA T20 in Bangalore on Monday, is also in the team. Ruturaj Gaikwad is the vice-captain.

The Ireland games will be held from August 18 to 23. 

Bumrah had surgery in New Zealand for a back injury, and has been rehabilitating at the National Cricket Academy. He and Prasidh played a Mumbai side in Bangalore at the Alur grounds.

In addition, Prasidh, who underwent surgery for lumbar stress fracture earlier this year, made a return to competitive cricket at the KSCA T20 tournament in Bangalore on Monday. Representing  Mount Joy Cricket Club against Sir Syed Cricketers, the Rajasthan Royals bowler took four wickets for 36 runs.

Prasidh, 27, has played 11 ODIs and last represented India in an ODI match against Zimbabwe in August 2022, almost a year ago.

"Prasidh is fit and the day's performance will give him a lot of confidence. He has been bowling at nets at NCA as well, and he has bowled in a few other match situations as well recently. He was able to bowl his quota of 10 overs," PTI quoted a source as saying.

Bowling coach Mhambrey said during the West Indies tour how the team has missed Prasidh and Bumrah. 

"Workload management is one of the important things we have been working on for the last couple of years... obviously we have missed Bumrah and Prasidh (Krishna) who have been part of the set-up," Mhambrey said.

India squad for T20I series against Ireland: Jasprit Bumrah (Captain), Ruturaj Gaikwad (VC), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Tilak Varma, Rinku Singh, Sanju Samson (wk), Jitesh Sharma (wk), Shivam Dube, Washington Sundar, Shahbaz Ahmed, Ravi Bishnoi, Prasidh Krishna, Arshdeep Singh, Mukesh Kumar, Avesh Khan.